Page 99 of Bite Marks

“Dana—”

“I’m sorry,” I rushed out, interrupting her. “The point is, I'm different now. I’m responsible. I care. But Iwasthat vampire. And I need you to know that before we—well, if you still want to be here with me…”

God, how childish is it to ask for reassurance like this?

"I've been told a few times that I can be a little dense, but maybe you're worse than I am, honestly."

I blinked. "I'm usually quite perceptive."

"Well, then maybe we should agree to disagree. Yes, Dana. I want to be here with you. I wantyou; don’t you get that?”

“Vi—”

“I couldn’t figure out why you wouldn’t just… make a move on me. Even after you saw me with Elsie. Even after I teased you with Ren. But you’re still punishing yourself, aren’t you?”

“I-I have no idea what the hell you’re talking about,” I stammered, refusing to meet her eyes.

How had she seen through my carefully disgusted masochism? I’d been letting my coven believe I was fine for months, working hard at the club to keep things together while privately wondering if there was any point to this at all.

Vampires who’d known me longer than Vi had been alive, some many times over.

And yet she was the one to poke a hole in my armour as easily as a piece of soggy newspaper.

“Yeah, punishing yourself. For what you used to be. For Cherie. About not being able to find the will. Garrett. All of it.”

“I—”

“If you’re opening your mouth to try and lie to me, don’t bother,” she said.

A surprised laugh escaped me, my mind hunting for the first thing it could think to say that wasn’t outright denying her incredibly accurate assessment.

“Are you hungry?”

“I could eat.”

“Why don’t we go get some pizza?” I asked, my hand finding hers again to lead her toward the door.

“Can I make a request first?” she asked, eyes catching on a large booth as we walked past it. “Can we get a photo strip?”

I unzipped my bag enough to peer inside, finding it still half full of coins.

“Just one, darling? Nah, let’s take a load.”

Before I could overthink it, I leaned in and captured her lips in a short, chaste kiss that did nothing but immediately make me cravemore.

But Vi was still my employee.

This was still a first date.

There were rules, expectations. And what I wanted was outside any reasonable boundary.

Though being hung up on her being my employee while I had asked her out on a date was a bit hypocritical.And a waste of time.

She tugged on my arm, leading me to the photo booth to sit on the bench inside. Vi leaned over me to close the curtain as I pulled out a handful of coins from my bag to feed the machine.

“I love these.” Vi sighed happily, fixing her hair in the little black and white screen. “Kayl and I have like a hundred stuck to the fridge.”

“Ren’s usually the one snapping pictures for us,” I said, leaning back to press the button to start the machine once I’d filled it with our remaining tokens. “I think if she wasn’t always so busy with the club, she’d be a photographer.”

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